Eden Rebellion is interesting in that it creates a very alien world and culture, very different to simply humans on another planet or say dog people on a planet, not that there's anything wrong with those, but here it's nice to get a fleshed out and truly alien feeling world to explore, full of it's own lore, Falase clearly having put much thought into it. My real issue is that it is a bit boring, and took me a while to finish, but Fifteen and Ruby are written well and it's an interesting world so makes for a good read at least once.

Decent enough, but often confusing. There was too much time focusing on the intricacies of the lore, worldbuilding, and factions, and not enough on the actual plot or characters. I think 15 and Ruby were well-portrayed here, and the descriptions were absolutely sumptuous, but the side characters were lacking and the overall plot resolution was a bit deus ex machina. It all ended up tripping over itself, unfortunately.

Unfortunately this one just did not grab me at all. I think it throws way too many things at the wall, and immediately you are confronted with learning about a very alien society and have  cavalcade of different characters you need to keep track of. Without that initial buy in, I was struggling to stay focused reading and really care about what was going on. The alien world was cool when I could understand it, but this one wasn't for me. (The villain also came sort of out of nowhere and was handled with far too easily)

The Fifteenth Doctor #12

'Eden Rebellion' (2024) from BBC New Series Adventures.

There's undeniably some very interesting worldbuilding woven into this story - and I highly respect its exploration of indigenous cultures in a high science-fiction fantasy setting - however, the story itself feels a little drowned out and muddled in this overly convoluted world it's trying to be set within, and the set of side characters and their motives and relationships, despite seemingly being very present, just feel a touch vapid and uninteresting to me. It's a tricky one to really describe my feelings on outside of "it just didn't do it for me", so I suppose I'll have to leave it with that. Definitely some cool stuff in here though, it just doesn't all come together in the end personally.